In recent years, there have been remarkable advances in functionality and capability of digital still cameras and digital camcorders provided with a solid-state imaging device (hereinafter also referred to as an “imaging device”) such as a charge coupled device (CCD) image sensor or a complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor. In particular, advances in semiconductor process technology have been providing solid-state imaging devices with finer pixel structure. Consequently, density of integrated pixels and driver circuits of solid-state imaging devices has been further increased. In these few years, the number of pixels in an imaging device soared from one million to over ten million. Furthermore, quality of images captured using an imaging device has been significantly increased.
On the other hand, display devices such as thin liquid crystal displays and plasma displays have been in the market. Liquid crystal displays and plasma displays are space-saving devices and capable of displaying high-resolution and high-contrast images, achieving high performance. Such increase in image quality has been spreading from two-dimensional images to three-dimensional images. Recently, three-dimensional display devices have been under development which show high-quality three-dimensional images to viewers wearing polarized glasses.
One of major three-dimensional imaging techniques is to use an imaging system including two cameras to obtain a stereogram (a set of a left image and a right image). Stereograms thus obtained are used in proposed methods of creating a depth map for a captured scene. For example, a pixel in a left image and a pixel in a right image are paired when the pixels show an image of the same object. Then, using displacement (disparity) between the positions of the paired pixels, the distance (depth) from the camera to the object is measured by use of the principle of triangulation to create a depth map.
A depth map thus created is used for adjustment of depth feel or blurring according to depth of three-dimensional images. For example, a three-dimensional image can be blurred to give a larger amount of blur to a region more distant.